2023 ILSS Symposium: Human Security Challenges: Past – Present – Future

In its eighth and final year, the University of North Georgia’s (UNG) annual Strategic and Security Studies Symposium explored Human Security Challenges: Past – Present – Future. The Institute for Leadership and Strategic Studies (ILSS), College of Education, and the Strategic and Security Studies Program in collaboration with the US Army War College, the Association of the United States Army, and the Army Strategist Association hosted this year’s symposium. The symposium attracted scholars and practitioners from South Africa, Poland, Romania, Lithuania, and Estonia, as well as those from across the United States.

The focus of this year’s symposium examined the role of state, non-state, and international actors in solving or mitigating human security challenges. Human security, as a governing principle, emphasizes freedom from want and freedom from fear as opposed to traditional national security, which emphasizes sovereignty and territorial integrity. Five symposium panels addressed the following topics: “Human Security Challenges in Post-Conflict Societies,” “Role of National Defense in Mitigating Human Security Challenges,” “Topics in Human Security Challenges,” “It’s a Jungle Out There: The Growing Threat of Environmental Crimes to National Security,” and “Putting the Past on Ice: Evolving Security Considerations Among Human Populations in a Warming Arctic.” Panelists engaged the audience in discussions ranging from the military to non-governmental organizations, academia, government agencies, and industry. Notwithstanding the broad range of viewpoints, the conversations’ outcomes support that there is much that can and has to be done to mitigate threats to human security, which ultimately morph into threats to national security interests if left unmitigated.